Final Hours

by CountDerpy

4 Hours Remain

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4 Hours Remain

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It was the only time that it ever truly hurt Pinkie to smile. Even in the past smiling had never made her want to cry, but watching the Cake twins obliviously playing with their toys like it was any other evening was too much for her too handle.

"Pinkie?" Pound Cake said as he pushed a toy over to her. "Why you sad?"

Pinkie looked down at him and smiled, doing her best to fight back the tears in her eyes. She knew he was too young to understand that he was going to die, despite growing into a very bright young colt. She picked up the toy with the brightest smile that she could muster and ruffled his mane a bit. "Oh silly, I'm not sad. Don't you worry your pretty little head."

"Okie Pinkie!" He giggled as he went back to chasing Pumpkin around the room. The slightly younger brother tackled his sister to the ground as the two rolled into a pile of stuffed toys that sat in the corner of the room. All three of them couldn't help but giggle as the plushies flew around the room like bowling pins. Pinkie stared at them with one of the happiest smiles that she had ever had, only being jolted from her saddened trance when she heard a knock at the entrance to the twins room.

"Pinkie? Can we talk to you for a minute." Mrs. Cake asked as she looked to Pinkie behind tear stained eyes.

Pinkie nodded and stood up, helping Pound and Pumpkin out of the piles of toys. "Hey you two, keep playing with your toys. Auntie Pinkie will be right back."

"Okay!" The two said with a wave as she walked out of the room and shut the door behind her. She looked up at the Cakes with a small smile, only to have it returned with frowns as Mrs. Cake spoke up. "Pinkie, deary, are you alright."

"Of course I am, why wouldn't I be?" Pinkie said with her normal bout of confidence, but the cracking of her voice hinted otherwise.

"Are you sure?" Mr. Cake said as he walked up to her. "You don't really have to force yourself to be happy if you aren't, you know that right?"

"Yeah, I know." She said looking down as she kicked her hoof along the floor. "But that doesn't mean I have to be sad either. I mean, somepony has to make sure everypony's last few hours are as happy as possible." She looked over her shoulder through the small view port into the twins room, where the two were now making the stuffed animals dance around. "If I can at least keep two foals happy as long as I possibly can before we all die, then that is enough to make me happy."

"We're just worried Pinkie. We know that you don't like seeing others upset and will do what you can to make them happy but, you can't just fight back the urge to be sad like this." Mrs. Cake said as she put a hoof on her shoulder. "I can see the tears that you are fighting back Pinkie, and it's not good for you to be handling yourself like this."

"I....I know..." Pinkie said as she looked up at them, tears streaming down her face. "I know I should be all sad and crying like a baby, but I just can't do that. It's not who I am to dwell on the things that make me sad, I can't focus on the fact that two young ponies are going to have their life taken away from them, not even knowing what it means to die. I can't focus on that because that would make them sad."

"Pinkie..."

"No, I just can't." She said as she looked up with them, wiping the tears from her eyes and putting on her best smile. "There is only a hours left and I am going to make sure that they have the best little night of their lives."

The Cakes looked to each other before turning back to Pinkie. "That....that's something else we wanted to talk to you about."

"What?"

Mrs. Cake looked into the room and sighed. "Pinkie, I don't want my children to suffer when everything goes to hell. I don't want them to be around to see their family dying around them and the world falling apart. I want their last memories to be happy."

"But I don't understand, that's what I am doing aren't I?" She said looking back and forth between them trying to think about what Mr.s. Cake had just told her. It was only when she was the two bottle of milk with a shimmering purple hue that she realized what she had meant. "Mrs. Cake, you don't mean that you are gonna.....r-right?"

"I told you Pinkie, I don't want my children to suffer." She said as she picked up one of the bottles. "It's a powerful sleeping potion. Just a few drinks and they will pass on peacefully without having to spend their last moments watching everything going t-."

"B-but you can't!" Pinkie snapped, cutting Mrs. Cake as her smile shrunk away from her face.

Mr. Cake sighed as he pulled Pinkie close. "Pinkie, what else could we do. We don't want our children to have painful last memories. What would you rather have happen, dying peacefully in your sleep with the last thing you see being smiling happy faces, or watching your family die painfully and violently around you."

Pinkie looked up at him and wiped her eyes. "I guess I would want to die happily, but I just can't think about watching them die before you two. No child should ever have to go before a parent."

Mrs. Cake looked at her, her own mind barely able to fight back her tears. "I know Pinkie....I never thought I would see the day where I had to let my babies slip away, but this is the only way. I have to let them go."

She reached for the door with bottles in hoof, but was stopped by a pink hoof before she could open it. She looked to Pinkie, who shook her head slowly from side to side. "No, you don't have to let them go."

Both the Cake's eyes widened in shock as she pulled the bottles away and looked in the room. "If they have to die this way, I don't think the last thing we want them to see is their mother putting them to death." She looked down at the bottles and gripped them tight before walking into the room with a smile on her face. "Alright you two, it's time for dinner and then off to bed!"

The twins whined as she lifted them up. "Do we gotta?" Pumpkin asked as Pinkie laid them in their crib.

"Yeah, all good little fillies and colts have to sleep now so they can have the energy to play all day tomorrow." Pinkie said with a forced smile, slipping the rubber nipple of each bottle into their mouths. The two wasted no time in gulping down the fluid inside while she watched on. Pinkie felt her hoof rising in anger and fear, but she suppressed her urge to swat the two bottles away from the children. Instead, she smiled and allowed them to finish their final meal in peace.

She pulled the bottle away from each of them as they finished, each one giving a small burp. Pinkie couldn't help but giggle along as they wiggled around in their beds, trying to find a comfortable position to sleep in.

Carrot and Cupcake walk into the room and lean down to their children, the two fighting back their tears as they kissed their babies goodnight. "Goodnight Pound, Goodnight Pumpkin. Remember, mommy and daddy love you very very much." Mrs. Cake said as she tucked them in under a blanket she had hoof stitched many months before.

"Goodnight mommy." Pumpkin said with a small yawn.

"Goodnight daddy." Pound said as he snuggled up to his sister.

The two left the room in silence, Pinkie watching as the first of Cupcakes tears fell to the ground. She sighed and walked over to the edge of the crib. "Sleep tight you two, gotta be well rested and ready to have a day of fun tomorrow!" Pinkie chocked out as she kissed each of them on the head. "I love both of you so much."

"We love Pinkie." They both said, bringing a tear filled smile to her face. She reached up and turned on the mobile as they gave a final yawn and drifted off into a sea of light snores. Pinkie's smile wavered as she walked to the door, stopping only to look back at the crib as the snores slowed to a halt, knowing that the two young children had passed on. She turned off the light switch and shut the door in silence before collapsing on the cold floor and sobbing into her own hoof, knowing that she had killed the closet thing she ever had to having children of her own.

Her own sobs of sadness and fear drowned out the slow thud of bodies on the as Mr. and Mrs. Cake drank their own vials of the same potion, kissing each other goodbye before falling to the ground dead, and the sound of the bell resonating once more throughout the town.

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3 Hours Remain

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Author's Note:

Please forgive the seemingly rushed ending, it was in fact not the easiest thing I have ever had to write. Hell I question why I even decided to write this chapter in the first place. Despite it being a fast chapter that was extremely hard to write, I hope you all enjoy.

...I need a tall stiff drink after this.

Comments

[The Collapsed Library]

damn...

I just don't have words for this... It makes me realize how much of a dick I was in majora at the end. I never even thought about my actions on the third day, ever... I... this just crushes me knowing the inevitability of the situation.
I... I have a lot to think about. like, fave and tracking for now. Keep going on this.

[CountDerpy]

6685985 I will.

And that is the kind of reaction I was going for with this story.

[The Collapsed Library]

6686032 Then you have hit the proverbial nail on the head. The choices each character made just... I don't know, they made me think about things I normally wouldn't have, things I've done or said, how much of an ass I am to my friends and family, just all the things we as humans enjoy dusting under the rug. This is a powerful one, and one I will enjoy delving deeper into as it progresses. It feels, i don't know... soothing? In a way, it helps me to wrestle with my demons not knowing when I'll be forced to stop by seeing them wrestle with theirs knowing full when they have to stop.

[CountDerpy]

6686263 well that's good then. I mean I truly never expected the cause some one to go into an existential train of thought, but if my story is doing that I must be doing something right.

[The Collapsed Library]

6686289 It's not just the story, it's the nostalgia of the base material, and a more mature outlook from when I first played the game. This is essentially the last 6 hours of Majora's Mask, a game I played so much as a kid I broke the cartridge, and as I was reading I started to remember how badly I treated every character, I never took the time to complete the romani's ranch minigame ever, I never reunited the lovers, I never did any of it. I just broke pots, killed junk, and beat the game with the BEAR MINIMUM of masks. Or, I just stood there, and waited until the end to see everyone die. That line of thinking got me on another, "what if I was stuck in Termina during these 3 days? What would I be doing? How would I feel if this kid who had the ability to save me didn't?" That then got me onto thinking about my life and how I've treated my family over the years. Whether or not, if I only had 6 hours to live, would they want me there with them, or would they rather not see me in there final moments. Now, my family has a tendency to exhibit depression-like symptoms, and I've inherited this trait. So most of it could be that. But this story is a beautiful work of art so far, and I'm honestly happy it helped me to see how I could improve in my life. So, thank you for this story.

[CountDerpy]

6686343 No problem, I enjoyed making this story and if I can awaken so deep seeded nostalgic existentialism I know I did good.

[Crystal Moose]

Goddamn that 2as hard to read, especially as a parent myself. As horrible as it was, the Cakes made the right decision.

[CountDerpy]

6687181 it wasn't easy to write either, and yeah while it was horrible to do, they made the right decision in my eyes...but with Pinkie paying the bigger price.

[Jason_LeCrown]

This has topped chapter one as the chapter i cried the most in and that's a good thing as it just goes to show the power of well crafted writing great job!!

[Xarsor]

I just feel as if there'll be a huge twist ending and the cakes died for nothing.

[CountDerpy]

6693513 I can't say for sure...but think about it this way...right now pretty much 99% of equestria...is dead

[Xarsor]

6693556 Stupid twist ending, killing a lot of ponies for no good reason.

[DeeJay6400]

I waited.. And Count....you weren't lying, were ya...
T_T

[CountDerpy]

6945552 wouldn't say lying, would more say buried under about 3 metric tons of college work that has forced me to quit another job and put me way behind on the stuff I would like to do

[DeeJay6400]

6945784 sometimes I wish I could cry

[CountDerpy]

6955385 hmm?

[Perfectly Insane]

Do you ever intend to finish this?

[CountDerpy]

9540411
I've been planning out the next two chapters, just getting some other ideas and updates done first. I'm expecting at least another chapter here by mid-May

[horses are fuckin weird]

DO THE

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